Tag Archives: Dark Green Fritillary

Friends, Old and New

Our first Painted Lady arrived on June 14th, six days earlier than last year. No problems with travel restrictions when you’re a migrating butterfly – if the instinct for international travel grabs you, off you go.

Like last year, our early arrival was a little worn after its journey from Africa, and thirsty, and gorged itself on Valerian nectar for quite a while, proboscis probing one tiny flower after another. Which allowed me, like last year, to take too many pictures. 

Once they’re revitalised with all that sugary fuel, they don’t hang around in one spot for long and they become a lot less tolerant of human beings with cameras. The newly hatched second brood in August-September time will be more brightly coloured and in pristine condition, but it’s still great to see these early arrivals again.

I also managed, on the same day, to take a couple of pictures of a Ringlet. I’d seen one a couple of days previously, but had only managed a smudged shot as the butterfly took off just as I pressed the shutter.

It flew off and disappeared over the horizon. Which was frustrating as I hadn’t managed to get a single shot of one last year.

I fancied another try and thought I might as well go to the same spot I’d seen the one a couple of days before. So that was where the dogs were walked. There were a few false alarms on the way: I saw what turned out to be (through the lens) a few male Meadow Browns that were all over some highly scented wild privet. But in the mile or so to the site, I didn’t see any Ringlets. When we got there I wasn’t too optimistic either. The one from a couple of days before had flown so far away, and so quickly, that it seemed as if it was just passing through rather than in its own territory.

But then there it was. Only a few yards from the previous sighting.

Simple colouring and markings, but a beautiful butterfly none the less, and with a lovely velvet finish to its wings – which probably isn’t apparent in the picture above. 

As soon as I’d taken my shot, the butterfly was up and away again, and soon out of sight. And I didn’t see any others on the rest of the walk – as had happened previously.

On our way back though, I did manage a shot of a Dark Green Fritillary that had landed – and stayed landed for more than a few seconds – on some Knapweed which is now beginning to come out everywhere. 

Butterflies love it, as can be seen with these four Marlbled Whites who lined up very neatly for the camera.

Sometimes butterflies just realise there’s a photo opportunity and produce the goods.

Before Life’s Rough and Tumble

We were out walking the dogs yesterday on the plain, when I started seeing a few large orange butterflies zooming about this way and that. I thought they’d be Dark Green Fritillaries, which I’d seen not far away in previous years, and I thought I’d try getting a picture to confirm it. 

They were not being cooperative. 

Dark Green Fritillaries are large butterflies and strong fliers, and they were going at quite a lick across the downland in search of whatever it was they were in search of. When they did land, it was always a distance away and even though there were not that many butterflies about, another fritillary always seemed to appear and fly past just before I got there, tempting the first one to take off and follow. Very frustrating. You have to move pretty quickly to keep up with them, and it was a bit windy too, which seemed to make everything speed up a little more. And then there was the issue that if you’re going to follow their erratic flight, you have to keep watching the butterfly ahead of you – at least some of the time – rather than where you’re putting your feet.  With grazing cattle having been there through the wet winter, the ground was uneven underfoot, to put it mildly, on the really quite steep escarpment slope where the butterflies had been steadily leading me.

I decided that if I was going to avoid injury, it might be an idea to try to get a shot of the butterfly in flight rather than continue charging about this way and that, up and down the escarpment like a lunatic. As my wife put it.

I increased the shutter speed, opened the aperture a bit, zoomed out to give myself a better chance of catching the butterfly in frame, and went for it.

Named ‘Dark Green’ after the colouring on the underwing

I managed to get a couple of shots fairly quickly which were sharp enough to confirm that they were indeed Dark Green Fritillaries, this one recently emerged and in beautiful condition. And good to see it in the midst of its natural habitat too.

Job done, I put my camera settings back to those suited to stationary subjects. And that was the point at which a fast moving subject in the form of a sprightly Roe Deer at the bottom of the escarpment, appeared. It looked amazingly elegant as it ran along. There was no time to change the setting again, so I took a couple of shots – with nothing to lose – and the pictures, though not pin sharp, didn’t turn out too badly.

At 1/400 and at 300mm her movement was surprisingly well frozen, I thought. The  young Roe deer was in great condition too which is always lovely to see. Many of the deer we get in the field next to our garden look as if they’ve had a pretty tough time of it, sometimes with scars all over their bodies.

This one was a beauty. It’s a delight to see creatures in peak condition before the rough and tumble of life has taken too much of its toll. Whether butterflies or deer.